


A Lot of Bull

by mcfair_58



Category: Bonanza
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:07:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27479293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcfair_58/pseuds/mcfair_58
Summary: An innocent question arises of just where the longhorn steer horns that hang over the Cartwright mantel came from.  The answer is not quite as innocent.
Kudos: 1





	A Lot of Bull

A Lot of Bull

“Joseph! What are you doing?”  
Little Joe faced the front door with a chagrined look on his face. “Oh. Hi, Pa.”  
Ben Cartwright closed his eyes and counted to ten. It never failed. He never knew what he was going to find when he opened the door. This time it was seventeen-year-old Joseph, standing in his work boots on the fireside table, reaching up and removing a series of hoops that he’d apparently tossed over one end of the pair of Longhorn steer horns that hung above the fire.   
Ben pinned his young son with a disapproving glare. “I’m waiting for an answer.”  
Joe twisted his lips. “Sorry, Pa. I was just getting in some practice for the social.”  
“And since when has ringing steer horns become a part of the social?”  
Joe hopped down. “It’s not, but ringing a peg about Hoss-high is.” His son shrugged. “I figured those old horns had to be good for somethin’.” The boy paused. “Say, Pa, how did you come by those horns anyway? There ain’t a longhorn in the whole of the Nevada Territory, far as I know.”  
“I think that might be defined as hyperbole, Joe,” a sedate voice remarked. Adam made his appearance, coming out of the kitchen with a tray of sandwiches in hand.  
“Hey! I want one of those.”  
“If Hoss catches wind of them, both you and I will be lucky to get one.”  
Joe was heading for his brother when, sure as the sun rose in the morning, Hoss opened the front door, twitching his nose.   
“Do I smell fresh ham?” he asked as he laid his gun belt on the credenza.   
Joe snatched one of the sandwiches and hid it behind his back. “Adam’s got some.”  
“Thanks, Joe,” his older brother snarled as Hoss descended on him. Adam took one sandwich and held the tray out. “Here. Have at it.” As Hoss settled on the settee, his eldest looked at him. “Pa, I overheard Joe. You know, it surprises me, but I don’t know where you got those steer horns or why.”  
It didn’t surprise him. He’d never told his son. He’d never told anyone.  
It was too…embarrassing.   
“Yeah, Pa. Where did those big old things come from?” Hoss asked, his mouth full. “There ain’t any longhorns –”  
“In the whole of the Nevada territory. That’s what I said,” Joe remarked, his mouth equally full.  
Peasants. That was what he’d reared. Peasants.   
“So, what’s the scoop, Pa?” Adam asked, settling into his blue chair.   
The three faces stared at him expectantly.   
Ben looked toward Heaven. These were the moments God chose to humble you.   
“Well,” he began as he headed for the fire, “I was in Mexico….”  
“Mexico? When was this?” Adam asked.   
“You weren’t born yet. It was one of my last voyages. We put into Coatzacoalcos –”  
“Coats are cool as…what?” Hoss asked, a frown on his face.  
“Do you want to hear the story or not?” he growled.  
Hoss looked appropriately abashed.   
“It was a layover. We were in town for a few nights. One of my mates….” He could see him now, old Rough and Ready Reddekker. “…a man named Merrick, dragged me into a poker game in one of the cantinas.”   
“Whoo-hoo!” Joe exclaimed. “You were playing poker? I didn’t know you had it in you.”  
“Just like a certain young man I know,” he said sternly. As Joe winced, Ben added, “And just like that young man I ended up in trouble.”  
“What happened?” Adam asked.   
“I was having a good night,” the older man said as he reached for his pipe. “I couldn’t lose. About two hours in a man asked if he could join the game. He was a cut above the others. I heard someone call him Don Heredia de la Pierre.”  
“Dang!” Hoss exclaimed. “That’s more of a mouthful than these here sandwiches.”  
Ben resisted rolling his eyes. “I was dubious, but the other men let the Don join in. Soon, the contest was between him and me. The gold and the cards,” his gaze shot to his youngest, “and the glasses of tequila were flying fast. I hate to admit it, but I bet everything I had but my shirt. So did la Pierre.”  
All three boys were leaning forward in expectation. “So who won?” Adam asked.  
The rancher winced. “I did.”  
“You don’t look too happy about it, Pa.”  
Ben ran a hand over his face, hoping to shove his mortification aside. “Toward the end of the game the Don was…shall we say…in his cups. He tossed down gold, and then letters of credit, and finally bills of sale, insisting – in Spanish – that he be allowed to continue. Old Rough and Ready wasn’t about to let me out of the game. And well, I’d had a few of those cups too. I placed one last bet and took the pot. Don la Pierre looked at the cards, at the table, at the men surrounding it, and then at me and shouted one word.”  
“What word was that Pa?” Joe asked.  
“Bull.”  
“Bull?” all three echoed.  
“So I shouted back. Yes, I had won – there was no ‘bull’ about it. The Don stared at me, talked Spanish to a few of his men, and then yelled again, ‘Bull!’ Needless to say by this time I was growing irate. I scooped up the gold, the papers, and the bills of sale and stomped out.”  
There was silence in the room. Finally Adam cleared his throat. “Pa, what’s this got to do with the steer horns?”  
He would never forget the next morning when, in front of all his mates, Old Rough and Ready split his seaman’s pants laughing as Don Heredia de la Pierre’s men delivered a very large and very loud Texas Longhorn steer to his ship and left him standing with the lead line in his hand.   
Come to think of it, the look his captain had given him was exactly the same one he had given Joseph a few minutes before.   
All three boys were stifling their laughter. Joe was holding his sides to keep them from splitting like Old Rough and Ready’s pants.   
“So why are the dang things hangin’ above the fireplace, Pa?” Hoss asked.  
The bull hadn’t survived the voyage, but the gold, papers, and bills of credit had. With them, he had financed his and Adam’s journey out West and put down the first payment on the land that would become the Ponderosa.   
Ben smiled. “They had to be good for something.”  
_____  
END


End file.
